Traitor (A Crown of Lilies Book 1)

by Melissa Ragland

  My parents were still awake when we returned to the manor, sitting together in the common room before the hearth. Their conversation halted upon our entrance.

  “Back so soon?” Mother inquired in surprise.

  “Quintin was tired.” I threw my barbed reply into the room and felt him tense behind me.

  “My lady is mistaken.”

  I slumped into a chair across from them, shooting my father an obstinate glare. “Your new man is ill-equipped for the rigors of polite company.”

  The Tuvrian bristled. “If you consider that pack of wolves polite company-”

  “Enough,” my father thundered. “Quintin, you are dismissed for the evening.”

  He pressed his fist audibly to his chest in salute and made an abrupt exit. Father fixed his tired eyes on me.

  “Why must you torment him so?”

  “Why did you assign him to me?” I countered with a frustrated wave toward the door. “Why not Gabe or Preston? At least they know how to behave with some level of civility. How do you expect me to maneuver with that prude glaring at me for hours on end? His presence is suffocating!”

  “I assigned Quintin because he is the best sword in this house and I trust your protection to no one else. Those are the terms of your freedom. If you want to see your Van Dryn friends outside the realm of public engagement, you will have him at your side.”

  I looked to my mother for help, but her sealed expression told me she would not interfere. They were as much her terms as his.

  Needless to say, my life settled back into a routine. My lessons with Quintin became a daily occurrence, and he took advantage of every opportunity to punish me for all the myriad inadequacies of my sex. I repeated the same drills day after day, my hands blistering and bleeding as that stone face looked on, waiting for me to quit. Out of spite alone, I refused to give him the satisfaction and pushed on through the pain.

  If I can survive Briggs, I can survive you.

  Once washed and dressed in proper attire, I spent the remainder of my mornings with my mother in the study, continuing my instruction in statecraft and intrigue. Afternoons were the best time, when I rode to the Chamberlain manor for my lessons with Aubrey. It was the one time I could leave the house without my scowling shadow in attendance. Gabe would escort me across the noble quarter instead, and then return hours later to retrieve me.

  Augustus seemed thrilled to resume our regular schedule, and we began reading the classical poetry and prose of ancient Elas. Most of it made my head ache, but Aubrey seemed to relish the philosophical writings in particular, tomes full of old men talking each other in circles. After each lesson, as we lingered before the hearth to sip wine, he would press the debate. I attempted to keep pace with him but just didn’t have the heart for it.

  The plays, however, I pored over with a fervor. Some of the books even contained serigraphs, diagrams of the ancient theaters, so cleverly designed that the stage could be flooded to portray sea battles on actual water. The egalitarianism, too, intrigued me, as it seemed to pervade many aspects of life, especially the arts. Even in the theaters, the design was such that the performers could be heard as clearly in the last row as in the first.

  My evenings contained a mix of events. Rumors circulated that I was being courted by the Van Dryn family, though nothing surfaced about our clandestine gatherings in Dockside. Fewer invitations came, many of the lesser families rescinding their offers in deference to a more prominent House. Still, there were a few, and we attended the occasional social gathering as my mother deemed appropriate.

  Once or twice a week, a handwritten note was delivered, Adrian’s scrawl inviting me to the Greyshor. On my first return visit, I was surprised to see the tavern full of faceless patrons once more. Eleanor circled proudly in a new dress of heavy cotton and a stainless white apron. There were even a few barmaids about, seeing to customers and swatting away wandering hands.

  “I’ve a business to run,” Adrian explained with a fond grin as the stalwart barkeep delivered our two mugs herself. “I certainly can’t expect Eleanor to run the place without some assistance.”

  “I done as much for many years before ye came along, lad,” she muttered at him.

  “Then I’d say you’ve earned a respite.”

  She grumbled something under her breath and ambled away back toward the kitchen.

  “I’ve brought you something,” Adrian said, returning his attention to me. Fishing a small tin from his pocket, he slid it across the table. “Bit late, I’m afraid, but I had to send home for it.”

  I opened the lid and gave it a cautious sniff. A thick salve filled the tin, rich smells of eucalyptus, mint, and honey wafting from it. “What is it?”

  He took my left hand in his and turned it over to expose my palm and the fresh blisters I’d earned that day. “We use it mostly during our first year in the fleet. The ropes tear your hands and the saltwater keeps them from healing.”

  “Thank you,” I murmured, closing the tin and tucking it away. It was a simple gift, but an incredibly thoughtful one.

  I put it to good use that evening, and the next morning I found my palms were much less painful than they’d been. Rising with the first light to don my sparring woolens, I made my way down to the garden. Quintin was already there, warming up. I stretched as he completed a cycle of his intricate dual-wield drills.

  “Here,” he growled, thrusting a small strip of muslin at me. I took it obediently.

  When it became clear I’d no idea what he meant for me to do with it, he snatched it back and grabbed my left wrist. Yanking me unceremoniously toward him, he wrapped the cloth around my palm several times, tying it efficiently at the back of my hand. Fetching a practice shield from where it leaned against the fountain wall, he thrust the plane of rough-hewn wood at me.

  “Work with the shield for a few days.”

  I slipped my left arm into the straps and drew my sword in my right. It had been a while since I’d practiced with a shield. The weight was uncomfortable and I felt just as off-balance as I ever had at the garrison, but at least it wasn’t rubbing my ruined palm. My commander squared up across the grass, a sword in each hand.

  I made a poor show of it, to be sure. Slow and stumbling under the added weight, I struggled to block Quintin’s heavy blows and slashed ineffectively as he retreated back out of range. Twice, he hooked a foot behind my heel and sent me sprawling to the ground. When he finally called an end to my humiliation, I could barely stand.

  “You were right.” He sheathed his blades with ease, the barest hint of exertion on his brow. “You are shit with a sword and shield.”

  My blood rising, I opened my mouth to spit some scathing retort, but he held up his hand and I bit my tongue.

  “Eventually, we’ll find something you are good at. In the meantime, you will at least learn to defend yourself.” He strode past me toward the house. “Dismissed.”

  CHAPTER 20

  The remaining weeks of winter passed quickly, with so many diversions at hand. Quintin eventually abandoned all attempts at improving my skill with a shield. I was physically stronger for the practice, but no more capable. Instead, he drilled me with sword and dagger. At first, I frequently forgot about the knife in my hand, but after the hundredth reiteration of “Left!” from my stoic and merciless commander, I finally started to adapt. It was slow progress, but progress nonetheless.

  My mother began to teach me darker skills, about various poisons and the methods to prepare and identify them. When I asked her why I would need to know such things, and how she came to know them in the first place, she was evasive. There is no harm in knowledge, she stated firmly when I pressed. Only the potential in how we choose to use it. She showed me books with drawings of various plants, many of which I recalled from my days wandering with Izikiel. As it so happened, several of the species that could be used medicinally could also be deadly in higher doses or by using a different part of the same plant.
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  The afternoons spent with Aubrey continued to offer a mix of ease and mental torture. Lord Augustus, spurred by his son’s enthusiasm for philosophical pursuits, steered our readings and discussions more toward that realm. We studied the neighboring nation of Elas, its long history as well as its modern state. Before long, Aubrey grew fixated on the Elan city of Agorai, the heart of research and foremost center of education in the world. It was a self-proclaimed distinction, but there was certainly nothing in Alesia to contest it.

  In Litheria, the prestigious Royal Academy houses some of the greatest minds our nation has to offer, each professor a master of his trade. The brightest boys of the noble Houses and wealthy guild families vie for the limited number of openings each year.

  In contrast, Agorai is home to a half-dozen great schools of philosophy alone, as well as a sprawling university that spans a quarter of the massive port city. As a young man at his majority, my friend quickly adopted dreams of studying there.

  “Think of it, Liv.” He paced excitedly before the hearth, wine forgotten in his hand. “A whole year of freedom, to live and learn and explore an ancient city the same as any common man!”

  “You would live in a dormitory full of other stinking, impoverished students?” I laughed. “Aubrey, you’d die of horror at such conditions.”

  He paused long enough to grace me with a scowl. “I could endure it, same as you did.” My dubious expression was soundly ignored as he resumed his march. “There are apartments in the university quarter, I’m sure. I could rent a modest room, or perhaps share one with a few fellow students of reasonable quality.”

  It was obvious I’d never dissuade him, so I didn’t bother to try. I’d miss him, though, if he went, and it saddened me to think on it.

  My occasional evenings with Adrian served to lift my spirits, despite Quintin’s storm cloud presence. We grew more confident in our anonymity and often spent our nights sharing mead with common sailors. I found them to be a riotous lot, full of elaborate stories and quick to laugh. Music was apparently a cherished seafaring tradition, and we were never without some form of entertainment. On nights when there was no fiddler in attendance, someone would invariably start in on a shanty, and soon an entire chorus of bleary-eyed lads was roaring along.

  It heartened me to see several young women among their ranks, and not a few stripling boys. They were hassled often, but always with a sense of amity and goodwill, and usually gave as good as they got. Dressed in the same sea-worn breeches and tunics, it was at times difficult to tell them from the men. I found a sense of camaraderie among them that I’d not known since my days at the garrison.

  Adrian, for his part, turned out to be just as foul-mouthed and licentious as any common sailor, though he kept the latter relatively restrained in my company. He relaxed greatly in the presence of his own kind. The carefully composed demeanor he maintained at Court melted away, and he often joined in heartily with both dance and song.

  It was on one such raucous occasion that Natalia let slip that it was my handsome companion’s name day. A great cry went up around our well-populated table as Adrian hid his face in one hand. A particularly garrulous man of indeterminate foreign origin jumped up on his chair.

  “Right, you salty fucks,” he roared in his strange accent. Numerous weathered faces turned toward him. “It’s the Commander’s birthday, and we’ve a mind to celebrate proper!” He pointed at one sailor. “Remy, get yer skin. I’ll fetch me pipes.”

  They both returned a short while later to post up by the hearthside, and the mysterious instruments referred to turned out to be a drum and a strange assemblage of flute-like pipes attached to a large bladder. A pulsing rhythm thundered from the stretched skin, beaten skillfully with a double-ended mallet. A flushed red face blew forcefully into one pipe, the bag inflating beneath his arm. A haunting note sprang forth, long and wailing, unlike anything I’d ever heard. Fingers grasped one of the stems protruding from the strange instrument, and as they began to dance across the holes, a lively tune arose.

  Sailors around me pounded the tables in time with the drum. Adrian was hauled unceremoniously to his feet by several pairs of hands and herded toward the open floor, my own personage similarly enlisted by a crush of insistent bodies delivering me into his arms. It was a flurry of festivity around us, with the strange, haunting music as its backbone. The drum drove us onward, feet stomping and hands clapping, exultation a fever sweeping the room.

  I don’t know how long it lasted. I surrendered my modest purse full of coppers to purchase a round for as many as such coin would buy. I’d no earthly idea, but doing so ingratiated me in the eyes of my companions, and I was loudly and drunkenly proclaimed their First. When they lifted me briefly above the crowd in their exuberance, I spotted Quintin pressed unhappily into one corner, a very inebriated patron leaning against his shoulder, no doubt regaling him with some rambling tale. My guardian ignored the man, those pale eyes catching mine just long enough to convey his seething displeasure before I was practically dropped back to the floor. Adrian caught me amid my graceless descent, storm gray eyes capturing mine as surely as his hands on my waist.

  I sobered, feeling the press of his body against me, heat radiating through the fabric of our clothes. A faint trace of his cologne threaded through my mind, the scent leaving my thoughts thick and disjointed.

  “I’m sorry,” I forced out into the small space between us. “I’d no idea it was your birthday. I’ve no gift for you.”

  Adrian smiled and shook his head, then lowered his lips to mine in a gentle kiss. Gods, his lips! So full and so desperately soft, I thought I might lose myself. My very core melted beneath that kiss, knees and spine doing the same as he followed the first with another. I parted my lips, inviting him deeper, gripping his arms as he slid one hand to the small of my back, pulling me tight against him. When he finally released me, I’d given up trying to wade through the mire of my thoughts.

  Our companions pressed fresh mugs into our hands and someone shouted an unintelligible toast into the din. More cheers, more toasts, and more drunken revelry and dancing followed, lasting well into the night. By the time we left the Greyshor, Quintin was in a rare mood and I was fantastically drunk.

  He helped me into my saddle but must not have believed me capable of staying in it, because he led both his mount and mine up the streets of Dockside in a slow march back toward the manor. I swayed silently atop my ambling gelding, reliving the memory of Adrian’s lips, his body pressed against mine. We plodded along through the early morning shadows, the streets empty.

  Or nearly.

  My gelding tossed his head in surprise when Quintin halted abruptly, head cocked, listening.

  They were on us before I knew what was happening, three men springing from some nearby alleyway. One grabbed my mount’s bit, wrenching him harshly to one side. The beast squealed in pain and terror, the other horse shying hard. A second man made a grab for its reins but missed, and it bolted into the night. With a curse, he turned back toward Quintin and drew a long knife. Moonlight glinted off two swords, crossed before the Tuvrian’s body in a defensive stance as he circled the third rogue, who gestured casually with a similar blade.

  “Now, now, boyo,” he crooned, his voice chilling my blood. “Don’t be doing anything rash. We’d hate to have to hurt the missus.”

  The tip of a dagger pricked the underside of my chin. My captor had moved alongside me, grinding his body against my leg in a grotesque parody of the memory I’d been ruminating on barely a moment ago. Bile rose in my throat as I felt him harden against my ankle. He sneered, lifting the edge of my cloak and dress to peer underneath. Icy terror shot down my spine, quickly followed by a blinding rage more forceful than any I’d ever known.

  “Maybe we could keep this one, just for a bit,” he called to the others. One dingy hand closed on my calf, sliding up my thigh beneath my wool gown, to the place only James had known. “Oh, I think she likes me!” he rem
arked at the lingering dampness he found there. The claws of humiliation and shame raked my chest as he fondled me beneath my skirts.

  “Left!” Quintin’s voice rang out in the night, jarring me from my terrified paralysis. In a panicked motion, I knocked my captor’s weapon hand away from my throat with my left forearm. My right drew Shera’s belt knife from under my cloak and, with all my force, plunged it into his throat. The whites of his eyes flashed in the dark and he staggered backward, grasping at the hilt protruding from his neck.

  I turned just in time to see Quintin’s upward slash finish the second of the two remaining assailants. The other already lay motionless on the ground, blood darkening the cobblestones. He rushed to my side, checking me briefly before stepping over to my attacker, who had slumped against a nearby building. Labored breath gurgled around the pooling blood and steel in his throat. Though his body blocked my view, I could hear Quintin wrench my dagger free from the man’s neck. The gurgling ceased. I leaned over the side of my mount and emptied the contents of my stomach onto the street.

  I couldn’t watch as he wiped his blades clean on the dead men’s cloaks before returning them effortlessly to his baldric. After cleaning Shera’s knife similarly, he reappeared at my side and carefully re-sheathed it at my waist.

  “Easy, miss,” he murmured as he tugged my cloak tight about me, that hard voice more strained than usual, those pale eyes a bit wider than I’d ever seen them. Taking the reins, he proceeded to lead my spooked gelding, and me atop it, back home.

  I don’t remember the rest of the journey. I’m not sure when I began shaking. I vaguely remember being unable to move when we arrived back at the stable. I recall Quintin’s arms pulling me carefully from my saddle and carrying me into the house. I remember the moment I realized what was happening – remember fighting him, demanding to be let go, not wanting to be touched. He threw up his hands as I shoved him away violently, retreating a few steps as I hugged myself and trembled beneath the force of that rage – that crushing helplessness.